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IX. The best of the first-fruits of thy land shalt thou bring to the house of Jehovah. X. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother's milk. These laws bear on their face the evidence of their primitive date and origin. They define religion not in the terms of life, as does the familiar prophetic decalogue of Exodus xx., but, like the old Babylonian religion, in the terms of the ritual.
There were doubtless many to whom the name and history of "Ur of the Chaldees" were already known. It may even be that copies of the books in its library already existed in the libraries of Canaan. There was one Babylonian hero at all events whose name had become so well known in the West that it had there passed into a proverb. This was the name of Nimrod, "the mighty hunter before the Lord."
The strength of Tyre is demonstrated by her resistance to the whole Babylonian power for thirteen years, "until every head was bald and every shoulder peeled." The place was, in the end, utterly destroyed. It was made as bare as the top of a rock on which the fisherman spreads his nets. The blow thus struck at the heart of Tyrian commerce could not but be felt at the utmost extremities.
To quote only his treatise of the next year on the Babylonian Captivity: "I wish that those to be baptised were entirety sunken in the water; not that I think it necessary, but that of so perfect and complete a thing, there should be also an equally complete and perfect sign."
How mechanical was the Babylonian redactors' method of glorifying Marduk is seen in their use of the description of Tiamat and her monster brood, whom Marduk is made to conquer. To impress the hearers of the poem with his prowess, this is repeated at length no less than four times, one god carrying the news of her revolt to another.
The result of it was the addition of Magan to his empire and the captivity of its king. The copper mines of Magan, which are noticed in an early Babylonian geographical list, made its acquisition coveted alike by Babylonians and Egyptians.
At the beginning of October in this same year, in his Babylonian Captivity, Luther comes out for the first time with an attack on this Roman doctrine. This would soon to indicate that in this writing he already holds the opinion which he soon afterward expressed in the Babylonian Captivity.
The lack of a picturesque building material in the Euphrates Valley was sufficient to check the development of such instincts. Important as the adaptation of the clay soil of Babylonia for simple construction was for the growth of Babylonian culture, the limitations to the employment of bricks as a building material are no less significant.
The description might serve as a paraphrase of the opening lines in the story of Ishtar's journey. The Hebrew Sheol is situated, like the Babylonian Aralû, deep down in the earth. It is pictured as a cavern. The entrance to it is through gates that are provided with bolts. Sheol is described as a land filled with dust. Silence reigns supreme.
While attempting to define the latter, it will be well to point out how close the resemblances are, and at the same time to draw a comparison between the Sumerian and Babylonian Versions of this part of the story and the corresponding Hebrew accounts.
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